word study- PARDON

Another little word study...



PARDON.

What a hope-filled, beautiful word!!! I LOVE it!

pardon- kind indulgence, forgiveness; to release a person from the liability for an offense, to remit the penalty of an offense.

Nehemiah 9:17 "but thou art a God ready to pardon..."

Isaiah 55:7 " and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon..."

"It is no secret what God can do. 
What He's done for others, He'll do for you. 
With arms wide open, He'll pardon you.
 It is no secret, what God can do."

To my Abba: Thank you, dear Father, for pardoning me, taking my sin, m guilt, my shame, and the punishment I deserved. True and total forgiveness flows freely from Your heart. And daily, humanity has hope because of it. Thank You, my God! 
Yours,
Amber

word study- MAGNIFY

I love word studies. I guess I have gleaned a lot from some in the past, and I often ask God to give me a word, and let me learn something from it. So, my last word was ..........

                                            magnify.

Here's my little study.

Magnify

"O magnify the LORD with me, 
and let us exalt His name together." 
Psalm 34

Magnify-to increase the apparent size of, enlarge, heighten.

I must decrease so He can increase. I believe  the only way to magnify the Lord, to increase Him, is to see His way, His character, His plans as higher and better than our own. My soul can only magnify Him as I recognize His supremacy and power.

Mary said: " My soul doth magnify the LORD., and my spirit hath rejoiced in GOD my Saviour...: For He hath regarded the low estate of His handmaiden..."


To my Abba: 
       I love You, Lord. I lift You up. I acknowledge my nothingness and Your everything. I magnify You, God. You only are worthy. 
Yours,
Amber
 

What More?

                                 Verses: Matthew 19:16-18 (Story also found in Luke 18) 

                              What More?

Okay guys....and gals, I am going to try to type out one of our Jesus times tonight. I am definitely not Amber, but hopefully I can get this all down right.

Our scripture for tonight is the story of the rich young ruler. Yes, I know it doesn't call him that in any one part of the story but if you read the story in each gospel, he is described as all three of those things.

The part we focused on tonight was the young man's response to Jesus when Christ told the young ruler that he would need to follow the commandments if he expected to go to heaven. The young man replied, "Which?"

Isn't that what we do sometimes? Jesus gives us an answer and we ask "Which?" instead of "What more?". In other words, how little can I get by with and still make it?

So we played football. Paper football. On the table. But first we made some rules. Nine to be exact. Probably it would have been nice to make it an even ten, but nine is what we had. The number is not really important as long as you have seven or eight at least.

What is important is what came next. All nine rules were enforced on one child, with care taken to make sure he was the less emotional one :). Five of the rules were enforced on the other child. Needless to say, the score quickly became quite lopsided. When the child who was being held to all the rules (and losing) complained, we asked "What's wrong? He is following all five of these rules."

We talked about how it is important to follow all of God's commands. It is easy for us to think sometimes that we are not hurting anybody. But the truth is when we don't follow God's command or rules, we are cheating somebody. And that's not right.



Challenge: Lord help me not to ask "Which?". Rather, let my heart daily ask "What more?"

Disclaimer: The devotions/lessons recorded on this blog are an attempt to make "hiding God's word in our hearts" a fun and inspiring time in our home. Most of the posts are recorded by Amber, and are from her point of view, often referring to "B" or "Brandon," who is her hubby. :)

Build Up or Knock Down?

"Words can build you up, words can tear you down, set a fire in your heart or put it out..."

• James 3:3-6 "The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity..."
•  Proverbs 13:3 "He that keepeth his mouth keepeth his life, but he that openeth wide his lips shall have destruction."
• John 6: 63, 68  "The words I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are LIFE."

Tonight our devotion was about the power of words, the tongue, and the affect they can have on our lives and others'. Each time Brandon would say something uplifting and positive, each child would get a block to add to his/her tower. He said things like " God is good and faithful." "God bless you." "Jesus loves everyone!" Once the towers grew pretty tall, Brandon took one block and said something negative or degrading and knocked down the towers, one tower at a time. This time he said things like "You may as well give up." "You are terrible." "OOOOoooh, You messed up big time!"  He talked about how one block knocked down the whole tower. He reminded the children that the blocks represent our words. One word can obviously do a lot of damage. The children wanted to do the lesson again. This time they came up with the positive, encouraging words. It was great to see their understanding and hear them practice using their words for JESUS. 

CHALLENGE...

"Lord, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O lord, my Strength and my Redeemer." Psalm 19:4   Let my words be true, let my words be LIFE, let my words help and bless others.

Disclaimer: The devotion/lessons recorded on this blog are an attempt to make "hiding God's word in our hearts" a fun and inspiring time in our home. Most of the posts are recorded by Amber, and are from her point of view, often referring to "B" or "Brandon," who is her hubby. :)

No One Can Serve Two Masters!

         No One Can Serve Two Masters!

Mat_6:24  "No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon."

Luk_16:13 " No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. "

For this lesson, we had the boys stand on the rug and told them all they must do was follow our directions. There would be a reward for following every command. Then Brandon and I began issuing orders simultaneously. B might say "Sing the Star Spangled Banner" at the same time I was saying "Be silent." B would say "Touch your toes ten times." And at the same time I might be saying "Swing your arms in the air." After a few minutes of this vigorous activity,  :) the boys were ready to answer some questions. Brandon asked, "Were you able to do everything we told you to do?" When they said "no," They were very ready to explain why it was not possible...because they couldn't obey both of us at the same time when we were giving differing commands. Trying to do so was frustrating and exhausting, and they ended up losing the reward. This understanding gave new meaning to the verses about serving two masters. 

   

CHALLENGE:

   Lord, let us love you with our heart, soul, mind, and strength. Let us listen and follow only YOU.

Disclaimer: The devotion/lessons recorded on this blog are an attempt to make "hiding God's word in our hearts" a fun and inspiring time in our home. Most of the posts are recorded by Amber, and are from her point of view, often referring to "B" or "Brandon," who is her hubby. :)

Two shall become one...

What does the Bible say about marriage? 

How can two people become one? 

"Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife..."

"They two shall become one..."

 "What God has joined together let not man put asunder."

                 This lesson was created to try to show the children the truth about God's plan for marriage. Each child drew two pictures. On one whole sheet of white paper, he/she drew Daddy. (one man) On a separate piece of paper, each child drew a picture of Mommy. (one woman) As they colored the pictures, Brandon talked about how we met and prayed for God's guidance during the time we met and courted. He read the scriptures and talked briefly about them. When the drawings were complete, Brandon asked the children, how many pieces of paper do you have? Could you take one the these pictures with you to Walmart and send the other one to Florida? 

               We looked up the word "cleave" in Strong's concordance, and found that it meant "to stick together like glue." He then told the children to glue the two drawings back to back, so that you could still see the man on one side and the woman on the opposite side. He mentioned how many times God gives a married couple children to love and be part of the family, and then drew a few children on each side of the drawing. He asked the same questions as before- How many pieces of paper do you have? Could you take one of these pictures with you to Walmart, and send the other one to Florida? 

              Then Brandon described what happens when a marriage falls apart. When divorce happens. He took the glued drawings and tried to separate them. The paper ripped in every direction, making holes, and tears, and a mess. Just like a family that separates, the damage is tremendous. every person on the drawing was negatively affected and broken. We were thankful to watch our children comprehend a little more clearly the beauty of God's plan for marriage, and we pray they will seek it diligently for their own lives.

 

CHALLENGE:  Lord, help us to portray your plan for love and marriage in our home. Let our love show daily in our words and interactions. 

Disclaimer: The devotions/lessons recorded on this blog are an attempt to make "hiding God's word in our hearts" a fun and inspiring time in our home. Most of the posts are recorded by Amber, and are from her point of view, often referring to "B" or "Brandon," who is her hubby. :)